You Can Have Any SERP You Want as Long as It’s Google
December 31st, 2007 by Michael Gray in GoogleIf you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Read my top posts or learn more about Michael Gray. Want more frequent updates follow me on Twitter. Thanks for visiting!
I was just reading the 10e20 top 50 of 2007 and picked this up check out the SERP for [I am Legend] screen shot for posterity …
The top 3 results are Google owned properties, for those of you still naive enough to believe that you aren’t competing with Google for content creation, I hope this serves as a wakeup call. IMDB ok nothing wrong there, but should be a little lower IMHO. Wikipedia (twice) because it’s a Google law that Wikipedia (and soon Knols) has to be in every SERP. Followed by the official movie website, which IMHO should be #1.
You may think Google is your friend today, but I think this really demonstrates that they are your competition. Sure they may not be competing with you right now in your market, but as they continue to expand into more and more verticals, there is no doubt they fully intend to squash you like a bug … unless of course you buy your way to the top with adwords …
Sphere It
December 31st, 2007 at 10:19 pm
I’m guessing, right now, 90% of the people searching for [i am legend] are looking for movie times, so Google is returning the results the users need.
I’m guessing the Warner Brothers site should be a bit higher since people may want to see the preview as well.
I can see where you going with this though. It could get quite evil. When Walmart signs a deal with Google and you search for [toilet paper] and you get a Google Checkout link directly to Walmart, then it will be too late.
December 31st, 2007 at 10:39 pm
I think it will be self correcting - people will turn away from ‘one central service’
*but* we are going to have to make that happen.
Why? Not just self interest - any monoculture is not healthy for humanity.
But the timeframe for the correction may not be near
December 31st, 2007 at 10:42 pm
interestingly, I see iamlegend.warnerbros.com at #3 - below the 2 onebox results, but above imdb and wiki
December 31st, 2007 at 10:49 pm
I think the ‘I Am Legend’ search is fine with the book being #1 since that’s what the movie was based on. However when you do a search for ‘I am Legend movie’, the warner bros site is still #3. Google should move the news, and their trailor listing to the top right of the page in that white space, and leave the SERPs alone.
The same search under Yahoo though shows the Yahoo movie site as #1 with a big image of their trailor site, and the WB listing as #2. Google isn’t alone for putting their company first in the SERPs.
December 31st, 2007 at 11:35 pm
Michael I recommend you to use
http://www.hakia.com/search.aspx?q=what+is+social+engineering+malware
Also understand the root of the problem
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_engineering
You can also see it being addressed by StopBadware a Harvard project incubator.
http://groups.google.com/group/stopbadware/browse_thread/thread/34784e113bb0e27e
Regards,
Igor
December 31st, 2007 at 11:39 pm
Michael, my comment has been flagged by your Spam filter.
You must be using Akismet and it flagged WikiPedia url.
Be very careful with Akismet it has a false positive problem.
Igor
January 1st, 2008 at 3:17 pm
Graywolf, would love to hear your thoughts on whether a full SERP of Google products would result in people moving away from Google (since its no longer organic per say), people just not caring since they wouldn’t know what products are owned by Google and are solely concerned with good results, or something else entirely.
January 3rd, 2008 at 5:36 am
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